


okay, i know i'm not ur type

by angree_baratheon



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Friends With Benefits, M/M, Or At Least I Tried, angst angst and nothing but angst, kind of ..... if i ever have the will to continue this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:55:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26218978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angree_baratheon/pseuds/angree_baratheon
Summary: Shōyō is trouble, but he's like a fine mess. You can't help but gravitates closer.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou/Pedro
Comments: 3
Kudos: 26





	okay, i know i'm not ur type

**Author's Note:**

> for niko, who saw the pedrohina spark i had and poured gasoline on it until we're both now stuck in this beautiful, burning empire.
> 
> and yes, the title is misspelled on purpose.
> 
> beware, this is not for the faint-hearted. i definitely have plans for this, and none of them are particularly happy. buuuuuut until i find that whim to write again, its probs gonna just end where it ends rip me. this is also isn't beta'ed because i like living on edge. might edit it in the coming days, but we'll see.

" _It's a song about a crush. It's about having a crush and the most potent crushes always happen in the summer. You're always drinking that summery drink. Sort of that perfumed night air. Such a magic to it. This is a song about a crush that endured and took twists and turns and I was documenting how fast I fell and the magic of that._ " _\- Lorde._

.

Pedro has always known Shōyō is trouble.

It's the hair, he thinks. He's not fooled by it: the bright orange colour of it, the shagginess of its weight. It's wild; the very definition Pedro tries avoiding because his life is a repetition of him walking around chaos and trying his best to keep his space in check. And his space is safe, and his space is predictable, and his space is quiet.

Shōyō obliterates everything he knows.

Still, Pedro finds himself pulled.

 _It's the hair_ , he thinks with this sense of bitterness that he almost likes. _It has to be the hair_.

.

It's everything.

Shōyō comes to him, eyes wide, asking him so promptly of his favourite character and Pedro knows he is done.

They spent nearly three hours that night going through re-runs of an anime Pedro knows by heart. At first, he can see Shōyō tries to follow along; mouth gaping and sometimes moving along with certain Portuguese phrases. _It's the hair_ , Pedro thinks again, feeling his chest swirls with both anxiety and fascination. He's never really had an anime marathon like this, he thinks. Their shoulders are too close, and Shōyō is, frighteningly, way nicer than the image he's made up in his head.

Pedro feels betrayed somehow; as if whatever simple jock he creates in his head and is collapsing is a personal offence.

At the end of the third hour, Shōyō's head droops. He yawns, big.

"You're tired." Pedro says - not judging, neither is he accusing.

Shōyō hums an agreement. "Yeah," he says, and then he smiles, soft and sweet; a forbidden image, _how can someone with so much muscle mass have such a tender expression?_ , Pedro has to look away. "But - this is the first time we hung out. I didn't want tonight to end just yet."

"Silly," Pedro tries, and he can feel his heart races. Nobody's ever wanted to spend time like this before, too. Shōyō is breaking a lot of his firsts. Pedro is out-of-breath with this abrupt progress. "I'm not going anywhere."

"Yeah?" Shōyō asks lazily, cheek against his pulled knees, and Pedro knows, in that moment, he is done.

"Yeah." He croaks, and shuts the laptop.

.

Shōyō is trouble, but he's like a fine mess. You can't help but gravitates closer.

His mama says it's a good thing. "He sounds like a good boy," Mama tells him, "He's pulling you outta the house more than I ever could." She's laughing over the phone, obviously pleased by the joke, but Pedro can't deny that it's untrue. With Shōyō, he's learning things he didn't know he would learn. He feels the beach under him and didn't hate the texture of the sand as much. He used to. When he was a kid, he'd be irritated by the slight feel of it in his grandmother's home.

He doesn't know what changed though.

Doesn't know why a simple smile, and a slightly whining request, could have him spend the few precious hours he would've otherwise spent inside reading mangas and hiding from his class' group chat, just to catch the silhouette of Shōyō spiking against the sinking sun.

Shōyō is blinding; Pedro can't tear his eyes away.

"He doesn't do it _all the time_ ," Pedro tries to protest, and this is true too.

Some days Pedro prefers the company of his bed, and pretends that watching Shōyō walking out, his back turned, and his disappointed "oh well, next time, then!" doesn't hurt him as much. But he thinks he needs these few precious moments he has for himself to remind his body of past experiences he has of people. And loud ones like Shōyō have the potential to disappoint him in ways that could cause pain more than a simple sting. Call him dramatic, but Pedro thinks he has an eye for heartbreakers.

And Shōyō - he's fit like one of the finest.

"Still," His mama replies.

"Still," Pedro hears himself echoing.

.

"You like stories, huh?" Shōyō cuts him off at one point.

It's embarrassing; to be caught in one of his rants, and Shōyō's eyes focused on him. Usually, it's the opposite. It was always somebody else talking and Pedro listening, voluntarily or not. (Although lately, with the sun, with Shōyō, it's almost always out of a full willingness; he walks in and he's got a silent permission to all of Pedro's attention and sometimes that scares Pedro than any confrontations he would've had to face; sometimes it gets his whole body all tingly, like he's floating almost. Like he's flying. Was this how Shōyō felt, on top of that height, staring down before the ball drops in court?)

Right now, out of some strange occurrences, Pedro is going miles-a-minute breaking down some finer points of a Studio Ghibli picture and his face is warm when the question is turned. Shōyō giggles, kind, but must've caught on that the pause Pedro's given is too long, and assures, "No! Go on! I'm sorry - did I say something I shouldn't?"

"No," he replies, swallowing. "I just - you're right."

And Pedro doesn't know exactly how to explain it, how to explain the deep churning and heat that goes all over his body under Shōyō unwavering gaze — _has he ever looked at anybody like that before? Shōyō's attention is always so quick to shift, so quick to move from one matter to another, it's unnerving, it's exhilarating, Pedro wonders if he has something embarrassing on his face: an acne he forgets to pop, or some hair from parts he'd forgotten to shave, god he hopes Shōyō doesn't notice_ — but he works through it. He tries.

"I think, um - that's why mangas and animes are so interesting. There's a lot of good ones out there. And the stories they tell... the plot twists, the characters. It's a nice thing, to see how it unravels. If the writers and animators could deliver it well."

"Hehe," Shōyō responds after a while. "I like it - hearing these from you. I never would've thought much otherwise."

"You wouldn't?" Something flutters deep in Pedro's chest, like a ball of panic. Like a butterfly.

Shōyō hums and he's gentle across the sofa from Pedro like this, cheek pressed against the cushion. He has freckles going down there, Pedro notices this up close, and he feels wrong, watching his roommate like this, but he can't stop. When Shōyō's sleeves ride up, there's a tan line: a two different tone presenting itself. It's tantalising. Pedro's seen so much tan lines in his life, but nothing's fascinated him as much as the one he's trying to pretend he isn't staring at right now.

Shōyō goes on. "I'm really, really glad I met you, Pedro!"

It's like knowing the two cars would crash in the end, but he puts his foot against the pedal and increase the speed anyway.

 _To see how it unravels, indeed_.

.

Turns out, it unravels like this: Pedro and Shōyō bumping into each other at a party that's a few miles away from their house.

Shōyō was invited by a group of young volleyball players he met a few nights prior, and Pedro was forced along because his cousin and the cousin's girlfriend thinks he really needs a night out. It's a new year party, he learns later, checking his watch every now and then and nursing about three cups of mixed rum in an attempt to drown out the loud music and dancing bodies. It's uncomfortable, Pedro is pondering and wondering if he should catch an uber back home, until he spots Shōyō laughing outside the porch with a few people.

"Hey," he calls after him quickly after.

Shōyō turns, and his cheeks are flushed red. He's both screeching _and_ giggling when he notices Pedro right back. "Pedrooo!" And Shōyō goes over for a hug: huge arms thrown over the thin expanse of Pedro's shoulders and it's taken Pedro all of his sheer power of will to not buckle under the sudden weight. He tries not to think about the way Shōyō and how his skin knows him now like this: close, and almost intimate.

"I didn't think I'd see you here."

Shōyō giggles, swaying. "Eduardo and Enrique invited me to this party! Did I tell you about them? Yeah! They invited me to this party! I played with them - volleyball - the other night. I won, and we played some more, and then they won, but only because I fell! I was like - _swoosh_ \- but then I misjudge the sands and - _SPLAT!_ It was horrible but Eduardo and Enrique helped me right up, and Jorge - that's the partner I had for that night - volleyball - but Jorge didn't come tonight, I don't think, I just met him a couple of times—"

"You fell?" Pedro asks instead, fixated somehow, with this information.

"Yeah," Shōyō admits, his voice lowering all of a sudden - as if he's sad by this confirmation.

He must think Pedro cared that he failed — _he didn't_ — and Pedro catches at Shōyō's elbow, doesn't think on how the contact will burn him all night. "Did you get hurt?"

Something returns to Shōyō's gaze, like a light, and he's smiling again, shaking his head rapidly. "Nope!" He wiggles a leg, "I'm all fine! I can walk really, really fast - I can even do a Naruto run! _Hah_ ," Shōyō gasps all of a sudden, "Do you want me to do a Naruto run? Pedro, it's okay, I can do it for you if you want. It's really fun. I used to it with Kōji a lot when we were kids!"

He bursts into giggles then, presumedly affected by the memories and Pedro - he can't help but feel fond over it.

Was it because Pedro's insisted on calling him Ninja whenever he watched Shōyō's play? He didn't mean to put the pressure. Of course, Shōyō was magnificent - amazing, something Pedro didn't know anybody could ever be, volleyball used to just be a passing sport that his cousins cajole him into trying when he was much, much younger, before he ran away to hide behind his mama and begged her to go home — whenever he's out there, but...

A moment of weakness, the alcohol thrums and sings under Pedro's skin, and he reaches out, ruffles the hair there. It's soft. Softer than it has any right to be. The alcohol buzzes inside of him.

"No, it's fine. Do you wanna sit? I can give you water."

They spend the next twenty minutes like that: on the side, apart of a whole but secluded as a pair, while passing the mineral bottle Pedro's acquired from the kitchen back-and-forth. The whole time, Pedro allows Shōyō to fill the silence. He talks about how New Year's in Japan are quieter; how he missed going to the temple with his family, and then his friends. There was this one time he went with his volleyball teammates in high school, and they all ate sweet dangos right after. It was really cold, he said, but somehow it didn't really feel like it too.

"I even bought a good luck charm." Shōyō tells him at one point, "Kageyama even threw it right back at me, saying he didn't anything like a charm, that idiot! Isn't that cruel, Pedro? That's so cruel. I just wanted all of us to be the best. Yamaguchi gave everyone charms, and Tsukishima didn't even blink."

"You really missed them, huh?" Pedro asks - a stupid question.

Shōyō, for a moment, has this look of blankness, before it dissolves into this kind of deep and painful longing that Pedro can't properly describe. He just knows he can't look at it any longer. He can feel his heart's tearing apart. Would Shōyō ever look at him like that one day? It's all such sweet wishes. But that's all it could ever be: some sweet but stupid wishes.

"So much," he whispers.

Pedro lets the silence stretch, and the music from inside the mansion thumps loudly enough that whatever awkwardness which settles are eventually kicked away with every beat drops and drum rolls. At some point, too long of a time, too long of him settling his heart, Pedro makes a move to leave. Shōyō immediately reacts, whines.

"Noooo, Pedro. The party's not over!"

"No," Pedro answers, serious. Always too serious. (This is why it's dangerous: Pedro is serious, and Shōyō touches him like it's nothing. Hands on his wrist and it's nothing. It means nothing.) "It's not. I wanna go home, though."

"Really?" Shōyō's eyes are wide, the brown of it reflecting the lights all over. It tugs on Pedro's heartstring, it steals a breath right out of his lungs. This isn't fair. "You can't stay?"

"I mean..."

"Stay," Shōyō says in the end, "We can go back home together later! I like the sound of it already."

Pedro, for some reason, really, _really doesn't_. There's too much what-if that's running through his head, too many maybe's that he can't afford to contemplate. But he sits back down, and he spends the next twenty minutes somehow finding time easy to pass while Shōyō tells more stories and joke. About five minutes into midnight, a person scrambles up to them. She has long blond hair, and a pierced bottom lip.

"You guys are together? For the New Year's kiss?"

"Huh?" Shōyō asks, but the girl is already moving away, searching for her potential partner.

Pedro suddenly wishes he'd left when he'd decided to. Shōyō blinks curiously at him, and that's expected, Pedro doesn't blame him, but he really doesn't wanna say anything, or answer any obvious question. He should've known this was a tradition that Shōyō wouldn't be aware of; it's mostly something so heavily western, and it's killing Pedro inside. To clarify means to give Shōyō knowledge, to give Shōyō a choice. Pedro wonders what is worse: watching Shōyō gets up to find a suitable partner, or watching Shōyō be by his side and does nothing at all.

"When the clock strives twelve," Pedro explains in the end, once he's sure his silence hasn't deterred Shōyō's prolonged staring. "People usually kiss, for - I don't know. For good luck? It's just. Some dumb tradition."

"Oh." Shōyō responds.

"Yeah." Pedro tries; his organs, he suspects, are on fire. "I mean - you don't have to, if you don't want to."

"But-" Pedro can see Shōyō has one feet drag across the floor. "Is everybody else doing it?"

Pedro looks around and watch the scene. Almost everyone is in a pair, or a group. They're all relatively drunk, and young, looking up to the sky for the coming fireworks; others are still chatting. From inside the mansion, Pedro can hear the DJ is explaining something. The countdown, maybe. Everyone cheers. So, "Yeah. I think so."

"Oh! Oh, then. I don't mind. It's just - kissing, right?"

At this, Pedro turns to Shōyō; his own eyes must be the sizes of two plates.

He couldn't have possibly heard that right, right?

Shōyō is grinning, friendly, but there's that flush again and it's obvious, _Shōyō is so pale_ , so he can be _so red_ , and he looks so good under these stupid party's lightings, and it makes Pedro's heartbeats function all over the place. Pedro finds himself swallowing, willing to dare himself that this must all be a dream. When he pinches his thigh, it hurts. How could it have hurt? It's a dream.

The countdown starts.

"Yeah," Pedro whispers - bad move. "It is."

Shōyō seems to flush some more. Pedro should be walking away.

 _Five_.

He leans in, instead.

 _Four_.

Shōyō closes his eyes.

 _Three_.

Pedro cups his face. There is no sweeter death.

 _Two_.

Pedro can feel two breaths, mingling.

 _One_.

The firework drowns everything else. Shōyō tastes like lime, like gunpowder, like disaster waiting to happen. Pedro can never go back.

.

They don't talk about it. 

Mostly because Shōyō claims he doesn't really remember much beyond bits and pieces, and Pedro honestly thinks it's a good thing that Shōyō couldn't recall the heaviness of his moan against Pedro's own mouth when Pedro's nails went and scratch a little at his hips. They both move on, and their life continues.

Pedro - finds excuses, though, to not be around Shōyō so much.

Not because he's hurt or anything — no, the pain is constant at this point; he looks at Shōyō and knows immediately he's another icarus whose existence only exist to warn other dreamers — but because he can feel the desire right in his belly and that damned thing is tangible, solid, a whole definite thing to be held; and what if it comes out one day without any restraint? How would Shōyō react then, to Pedro's naked wants? No, Shōyō would turn away, would deny even this small thread of friendship Pedro hadn't known would mean this much.

Shōyō has made it clear that he'd come all this way for one thing and one thing only.

Pedro would be a fool to mess that up.

 _If nothing else, let me just help_. He prays - the rarest times he ever did. God is quiet. _If I can't be anything more than a pit stop, at least let me be a useful pit stop_.

Shōyō comes to him for lessons in Portuguese, and Pedro bought him an A3-sized notebook so that the both of them could write. Shōyō beams and Pedro glances away before he could see how Shōyō teeth nibbles at his lips; the same action he's done just a few nights before, where Pedro carries the sting for days.

.

"Are you two not good, love?" His mama asks one day - she always has a way of knowing.

Pedro should feel irritated from the clairvoyance, but all he senses instead are a rush of relief. At least there's one person still who could see right through him, even if Pedro's keen to keep all of his secrets close to his chest. "No," he lies, even though it's not a complete lie. Shōyō still smiles at him, bright and kind; it's just Pedro who is in the wrong. He keeps avoiding Shōyō, fearful of his own longing. He's always so distracted too, and he can feel his insincerity like bricks in every tone he uses.

It's pathetic.

Shōyō must've senses it too; he keeps shooting Pedro worried glances.

"Pedro." Mama's voice is stern.

"I just, I don't know-" Pedro licks his lips, pinches the bridge of his nose. "I think it's slowly coming to me that he won't - be here forever. He'll move back one day, Mama. It's hard."

A truth swapped with another. This should work.

"Ay, my love." Mama's reply is a sigh.

"Every time I look at him now, it's like - I know he's going to leave. So, what's the point?"

"It is not without point, my precious son." Mama consoles him, her voice the familiar crooning Pedro knows from childhood; Pedro recognises in his bone. "Love is never without point. It is never meaningless."

Pedro is silent. When he closes his eyes, he thinks about the way Shōyō licks his mouth; the way Shōyō kisses him harder when he groans. The fireworks are a distant in their ears.

"Don't think too much of the ending. Just cherish him while he's here, yeah?"

"Okay."

"You will be fine, Pedro."

How can he, when he's burning at the sight of Shōyō, always? He lies again: "Okay."

.

"I didn't think you'd come," Shōyō tells him one day.

He'd only just finished a match - expectedly, he won - and they've separated ways after grabbing a quick late lunch with Heitor and Nice. Pedro's met Heitor before, and he'd heard about Nice only a couple of times; so it was pleasant to finally relate a face to a name. They're walking now, by the beach, and Pedro tries to take in everything else that the scenery holds: the shrieking children running past, the busied shopkeeper selling shaved ice and cool drinks, the adults lazying around on a fine day - not the way he feels like his heart could burst right out of his skin and leap right away from him.

Not the way that, if he'd allowed himself to fantasise enough, he would've dared to call this moment romantic, maybe. Special.

But it's not. _It won't be_ , Pedro internally insists. It can't.

"What do you mean?"

Shōyō doesn't seem perturbed by his own question. He continues on, relentless, strong. Everything Pedro could only ever dream he could be. "I just - I don't know. I kinda got a feeling that you might be..." He trails off, and his voice sounds - Pedro doesn't know, but he doesn't like the down lift of it. Doesn't like that Shōyō looks a little pained even having to admit what he admitted. Pedro stops walking, hands in his pockets, and he stares. Eventually, Shōyō slows down. Looks back at him.

The orange-haired man fidgets. "That you're busy lately, is all!"

An attempt to brush things off, Pedro thinks; 'cause the smile isn't like the ones Pedro usually sees. This one is forced. Put there for show. Pedro feels his hands curling right into a fist, and that surprises him. He's never really been the type to sort to anger. His parents were notoriously known for it, their tempers, but their son? No, Pedro was always praised as calm. Too calm, sometimes. Careful and composed.

Despite the heavy anxiety that haunts like ghosts at the back of his mind. (Not that they know this; not that Pedro would let them know.)

As if alerted by his familial history, the rage fades, and all that's left are guilt: sticky like glue, ugly like tar.

"Of course I'd come," _You invited me_. "I wouldn't miss it for the world."

Shōyō seems surprised by this; taken aback. He blinks, tries to maintain that smile, but it's wobbly. Pedro wants so badly to reach out, brushes away at those cheeks until he cups the back of Shōyō's head, and he would comfort the man like that: close, and personal. And he would ask Shōyō why, why that face, what happened, would Shōyō please tell him? Cause he would fix it - anything - of course, he would. He's - enchanting, and wilful, and determined and Pedro is always swept away by him, and doesn't he know this? Doesn't he know that Pedro would do almost anything?

"Yeah?" Shōyō's voice shakes a little, and it's - Pedro thinks he shouldn't have noticed it, _but he does_.

"Hey." Pedro reaches out, and his palm reaches over to clasp Shōyō's shoulders.

He can see the other man follows the action, he can see Shōyō swallows.

"What's wrong?"

Shōyō looks like he's holding his breath, like he's questioning whether he should be answering, until: "I thought I did something." His body drops; the energy that usually runs right across him escapes, never to be returned. He deflates, so simply, like a balloon. He continues, "I just - I thought I offended you, I was loud or something, or overstepped my boundaries, 'cause I do that, I get excited easily, or I was just doing things without thinking, and now you just didn't wanna talk to me anymore, and - I know it's stupid, maybe it's just in my head, but you don't look at me, or you won't, whenever I tried to meet your eyes, you would just—"

Oh God, oh God, this isn't what Pedro _wants_. "Shōyō."

"—And I'm sorry. I really am. Whatever I did—" He's starting to bow now, this brazen, amazing, polite, beautiful man and Pedro's heart shatters. He did this. He caused this.

"Shōyō, it's not your fault. I - no, don't - it's not your fault." He has to physically hold Shōyō up, and the both of them are trembling.

Pedro thinks again: _this isn't what I want_.

"It's not your fault," he repeats again, just in case Shōyō doesn't hear him the first time.

The man is grasping back on Pedro's outstretched wrists, and Pedro will dream about that tonight, he's sure of it: the expanse of those fingers wrapped around his thin hands. How much he wants to bite into the skin there, leaves his bruises.

"I'm sorry." He confesses, ashamed.

Shōyō will hate him, he knows this, but if it's the way to let the man out from this guilt...

"It's—" Pedro's voice is gone. He has to find it. _God, I asked you for one thing and you betrayed me_. "It's not you."

Shōyō blinks, innocent, and Pedro thinks back all those months - a year - when Shōyō arrives; when Pedro had shut himself up the whole day the man moved in. He was so rude. He'd been regretful of it ever since. And yet, right now, he wanted nothing more but to go back and maintain that facade. If only he could avoid this. If only he could have a future with Shōyō where he doesn't have to see Shōyō's expression crumples up like this.

"We kissed. At New Year's." Pathetic. Atrocious. Betrayer. Pedro is filled with shame. "And I liked it."

He takes back his hands. Pedro wants to run away. He wants to disappear.

"So, it wasn't you. It wasn't-" Pedro thinks back about that night, about how swollen their mouths had looked like right then, how Shōyō had grinned, cheeks pink, and confessed that he'd liked it. But they were both drunk; Pedro should've known better. "If anything, I should be begging for _your_ forgiveness."

"Oh." Shōyō answers.

Time stretches. Pedro feels like puking.

"I think I should go—" He wants to pull out his phone, he wants to call Mama, and he wants nothing else to do with Shōyō anymore. He's a bad friend. He's horrible. Shōyō _trusted_ him, and he's-

"No." Shōyō's touch is firm, resolute. "Pedro."

"I should go." Pedro doesn't want to look at him. He couldn't.

"I thought it was a dream." Shōyō says suddenly, and it changes everything.

"I thought it was a dream," he repeats, and Pedro turns; meets the man's eyes. Both of them are trembling, he thinks; this time, a different reason. "I... I liked it too."

Pedro is doomed.


End file.
